But the 28-year-old responded well scoring his first ever World Cup goal, something Ferdinand was pleased to see.

"I think in the Uruguay game he reacted quite well, in terms of he got in positions to score goals, he had a couple of chances that maybe he would have expected himself to do a little bit better in.

"On another day he would have banged that left footed shot in definitely.

"Then he still got in and scored a goal and he was our most productive player on the day in terms of getting chances and putting one in the back of the net, so I said he reacted in response to the first game where he didn’t really look like scoring.

"But at the end of the day, England will be judged and so will the players, and Wayne Rooney is our talisman and he will be judged accordingly.

"I’m sure he’s man enough to take any criticism that is going to come his way if it does."